Wyoming, Here We Come! Another new state for us in the RV! We will end up spending about six weeks traveling the state, so hope to get a good feel for the landscape, activities, people and the culture. Wyoming is a large state geographically (at #10), but is dead last in population. That sounds like many small towns and that is what we like. The Cowboy State has vast treeless plains, the Rocky Mountains, and the national parks of Yellowstone and the Grand Tetons.
Durango & Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad
This experience could very well be the highlight of our 2019 Summer adventures! The Durango & Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad. Imagine being pulled by a chugging coal-fired steam locomotive through the western town of Durango, through some fields, then up into the mountains. Many times the train rails ride on a narrow rock ledge wrapping around a rock mountain with views several hundred feet straight down! I’ll describe the ride in some more detail later in this post, but first, here are some facts on this amazing passenger railroad…
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Durango, Colorado & Family Visit
Pat’s brother Robert has a summer home in the mountains near Durango, Colorado (6,500 feet and 18,000 pop) and has been asking for us to come visit. It has always been high on our agenda, but we never had good timing until this summer while RVing through Colorado. So, we decided to leave the 5th wheel coach in Colorado Springs and drive the 303 miles in our new little Honda CRV instead of crossing the mountains with the rig. We had a wonderful week full of family time, activities and mountain vistas!
Advance Trip Planning for 2020
Where do go next spring, summer, and fall? That is the question. When we started this RV Journey about two years ago, the map was a clean slate. It was all wide open territory. Now we have about 31 states that we have visited at some level. So, for next year, do we want to repeat some places or head out to some new and unknown places? Man, this is kind of like work. But fun and exciting!
Denver, Colorado – Part 2
And here it is, late June! What in the world happened to the month? I often wonder at how swiftly time goes by. It seems to go by faster when we are busy and in an area with much to see and do. The Denver Colorado area certainly qualifies as having much to do, so here we are wrapping up our second and final week in the area. We have packed a multitude of activities into our time here plus have taken a few required down days to rest up a bit. Here is a recap of our week:
Denver, Colorado – Chatfield State Park
Our two week stay in Colorado Springs came to a quick end. It was a busy and fun couple of weeks, but that is the nature of our travels. We just get used to one location and then it is time to move on. Our next destination is due north once again to another beautiful Colorado state park: Chatfield. Located just south of Denver (pop 716,000 and 5,280 feet elevation) in the town of Littleton and on a lake. Sounds great! Until we had a failure of our hydraulic jack system and could not leave!
Colorado Springs, Colorado – Part 2
This blog update covers the final week of our two week in this beautiful area of the country. Colorado Springs, Colorado is about 30 minutes north from our campsite at Cheyenne Mountain State Park. In this update, I will cover our trip up to Pikes Peak, a drive to Cripple Creek, and lunch at Manitou Springs. We are fortunate to be able to share our experiences with our good friends, Calvin and Sue, also camping in the park with their RV.
Painting Update – Places We Have Been
A few months ago in this blog, I included some new hobbies that I had picked up over the winter. Namely wood carving and painting. I have been working on the carvings occasionally, but have started painting some landscape scenes as we have traveled to different locations. Places we have been…
Colorado Springs, Colorado – Part 1
We really enjoyed our short five day stay in La Veta, Colorado, but as always, there are more places yet to see on our calendar. Next up, we continue our journey due north to the city of Colorado Springs, Colorado. It is just over 100 miles and is mostly interstate on I-25. No need to even fuel up the truck since it is at 3/4 full.
La Veta, Colorado – The Spanish Peaks
It is a new state for us: Colorado! It was once again kinda sad to be leaving this very beautiful and diverse state. We have been in New Mexico for five weeks and it is time to move on. We have seen so much from the southern hot and dry desert of Alamogordo to Carlsbad Caverns to the high desert in Santa Fe to the northern NM mountain ski resorts in Taos and Angel Fire. Wow! Now we continue our journey northward to La Veta, Colorado and the Rocky Mountains!